Hello gentlemen. What I am trying to learn is how to create my own HMI using Visual Basic/OPC/Excel. I had the good fortune of spending a little time with some techs from a neighbouring plant and was introduced to this built it yourself approach. Saw a few programs working. Very impressive. However, they were running on a controllogix platform and we are running PLC5s. Shouldn't make much of a difference as its all being driven by RSLinx I think. Spent a bit of time on Rockwells site trying to figure it out. Didn't learn much. What I need is a simple explanation with a few details on how to set up the OPC server/client. I can stumble through the VB part but I'm having difficulties getting my data out of the PLC and into the VB program. Any and all suggestions/ideas would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

If you are going to use VB as an OPC client, program the ASYNC !! procedures/events and not the sync procedures/evets to read data or write data. Sync takes to much time to make a fast responding user interface.

Thanks guys. I was really busy at work today and didn't have a chance to respond. I thank you for your responses. I plan to invest some time into this during the weekend. However, if anyone else has any experience I sure would appreciate a brief overview. Thanks.

When adding items to a group, the vb program receives a serverhandle for the item. In the data change event the serverhandles and the data are transferred. Store your serverhandles to make it work.
Remove groups and server connections before closing the program, otherwise your groups remains active.
It is also possible to hit the opc server to send all the data to your project with the datachange event.

Just got home from work a few minutes ago. Still haven't even had a beer. Brutual problem at work today. Had to chase down a ground fault. Took all day. Thanks guys for the responses. I'll be looking into it tonight but I won't really have a lot of time until the weekend. Darn job. I'll keep you guys posted. Looks like a lot of fun. Anuthing else you can think of that will help would be great. I imagine that others want to know how to do this also.

Jiri I was just looking into your DF1 driver but I don't believe that it supports AB PLC5s though.

I apologize. Duh. It's been a while since I looked at it. It's true I never got around to do it for PLC5.
Since I have been doing the travel business I got disinterested in controls, particularly in view of the fact that the field is going to hell, just wait when H1B visas go up to 180 000 per year.
Our idiot in charge is working on that.